JUANITA CRAFT

Written by Cynthia J. Beeman
Read by Teresa Palomo Acosta

Produced by KUT for Texas Women's History Month in cooperation with the Ruthe Winegarten Memorial Foundation for Texas Women's History. First broadcast on Austin radio station KUT in March, 2011.

Resources

Mamie L. Abernathy-McKnight, "CRAFT, JUANITA JEWEL SHANKS," Handbook of Texas Online (http://www.tshaonline.org/handbook/online/articles/fcr59).

National Park Service, We Shall Overcome: Historic Places of the Civil Rights Movement, Juanita Craft House, http://www.nps.gov/nr/travel/civilrights/tx1.htm.

Return

The granddaughter of former slaves and the daughter of educators, civil rights activist Juanita Craft grew up in Austin and attended Prairie View and Huston-Tillotson universities, but even with a college education could only find work as a drugstore clerk in Galveston, as a dressmaker in Dallas, and as a maid at the historic Adolphus Hotel. She joined the Dallas chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People in 1935, and from that time on worked tirelessly for the cause of civil rights. As an NAACP state field organizer, she helped organize 182 branches throughout the state of Texas. Her work with the NAACP youth council in Dallas was so successful that it was emulated by other chapters around the country. She held the distinction of being the first black woman to vote in Dallas County in 1944, and in the 1950s and 1960s led protests aimed at integrating public universities and the State Fair of Texas. She led the NAACP youth council in picketing restaurants, theaters, public transportation, and other venues in Dallas.

Craft was elected to the Dallas City Council in 1975 when she was 73 years old. She held leadership positions in local, state, and national civil rights organizations and won numerous awards. The City of Dallas named a recreation center in her honor, and her simple frame house is now the Juanita Craft Civil Rights House Museum.